In 1996, his final round included several bogeys in the middle of his round, a s into the water on the 12th, and another s in the water on the 16th.
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He went on to capitalize on a Jordan Spieth collapse to win the Masters by three shots after firing a five-under 67 in his final round.
It was one of the most shocking collapses in the history of golf, and even moved Jack Nicklaus to issue an unprecedented statement.
It looked like we were headed for another Jordan Speith Sunday.
Again, the math is remarkable for a player of Spieth’s caliber: He’d walked off 9 with a five shot lead, approached 12 with a three-shot lead and left 12 two strokes behind.
No, I don’t expect Spieth to get a ton of sleep tonight, but you don’t join these elite ranks of the game without an incredible level of mental strength. “He’s a wonderful talent and a wonderful young man”. Spieth said. “Big picture, this one will hurt. It will take awhile”.
“Four birdies in a row and I knew that even par (on the back nine) is good by at least a shot and sometimes that makes it hard”.
Spieth did rebound with birdies on Nos. “It was a very tough 30 minutes that I hope does not happen again”.
Jordan Spieth’s Masters meltdown on the back nine Sunday was hardly the first at Augusta National.
Willett called him “a class act to be able to hold face and stuff as he did”, for this Masters was lost just as much as it was won, if not more.
“I didn’t take that extra deep breath and really focus on my line on 12”, he said.
Playing three groups ahead, Willett had birdied the 13th and 14th to reach the top of the leaderboard and another on the 16th helped complete a superb 67.
He had the right club but not the “right swing” to get the ball flight he wanted, he said. It’s a small target with a bunker in back and a shaved bank in front of the creek. He had led the Masters for a record seven straight rounds until then – going wire to wire in 2015 and then leading through the first three rounds of 2016.
“And this week. I’m just going to have to wait and see if it sinks in”.
“The backside wasn’t what I would like it to be”, Day said. “At 15 I looked up and suddenly I was 3-under and one back of the lead”.
Willett saw the scoreboard and couldn’t believe his eyes.
“The wind was down today so you could be more aggressive, but still it was tricky”, said Westwood, who posted his 18th top-10 finish in the majors.
For Spieth, the next major can’t come soon enough.
A bogey from the bunker on No. 10. He still had a two-shot lead and only needed to get past the unsafe par-3 12th to settle himself, especially with two par 5s in front of him. Despite birdies on 13 and 15, he came in at 41. A short birdie miss on 16 was a dagger, with a bogey on 17 pulling the plug.
Along with Willett, the only other player not to drop a shot all day was Paul Casey, who also shot a 67 to finish tied fourth.
He became only the second Englishman to win the coveted Green Jacket, following three-times champion Nick Faldo, and ended a barren title run by Europeans dating back to Spaniard Jose Maria Olazabal’s second victory here in 1999.
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Augusta National is planning to build a new media center that will open in time for the 2017 tournament, 27 years after the current building replaced an old quonset hut that housed the press corps for many years. Trying not to make mistakes, trying to be too careful, that’s the stuff that’s holding me back. Spieth was already wearing one of his own.
